The Blazing Sun
by Pebbletooth
Summary: Emmy ran after Travis, yelling and screaming with a bow in hands. I sat on my bed, glancing up from my book. And to think this was one of our better days. R&R Please! Flames are allowed.
1. The Ares Cabin Grow Unicorn Horns

Chapter One

**THE ARES CABIN GROW UNICORN HORNS**

I woke to the sun flashing brightly in my eyes. Gee, thanks dad. Stifling a yawn, I half-climbed, half-rolled out of my bed. The rest of my cabin was still asleep, no doubt tired from last night's capture the flag. We had totally pwned the other team, if I may say so.

"Alright guys!" I shouted with half closed eyes. "Time to greet the day, eat some breakfast, and try not to be shot by Chelsea again!"

Gradually, the whole cabin woke. Chelsea, after stretching, shot me a glance. I smirked. My twin sister may be a daughter of Apollo, but she was about as good with a bow as a rock. Every single one of us has had at least one mishap with Chelsea and her arrows. But she means well, and she's greatly improved than when we first arrived. Then, her arrow had dropped to the ground and the string had lashed her arm. That wasn't a happy day.

Moving about as fast as a glacier, the Apollo cabin shuffled towards breakfast. We actually didn't number that many, only six, and we were all pretty young. In fact, I'm only 12 and somehow I'm the counselor of the cabin. Kinda weird, although I've been here for enough years: four. Same with Chelsea, of course.

Through my deep pondering and still-asleep-feeling, I ran smack into Sydney, the most violent girl I've ever known. Correction, the most violent _person _I've ever known.

"Watch it, flame head!" she snarled. She may be aggressive, but Sydney needed help in the 'name-calling department'.

"Throw yourself down a well," I retorted sleepily as we walked past her.

Breakfast was uneventful, except for the Ares cabin's colorful insults. They were almost funny. One of them was trying to rhyme the word 'orange'.

Now fully awake, I realized that we were supposed to be at the archery range, apparently working with the Poseidon cabin. Great…

When we arrived, I could see Matthew attempting to string a bow. It looked more like he was wrestling it though.

"Okay," I sighed. "Everyone practice. Emmy, work on the 'split the first bull's-eye with the second arrow thing'. Chelsea, I think you'd better work with me and Matthew."

Matthew was currently the only child of Poseidon, so these lessons are pretty easy… I wish.

"Gimme' that," I muttered as I yanked the still unstrung bow from his grasp and swiftly strung the short bow. I handed it back to him. "Alright, work on actually hitting the target." I shot a look towards Chelsea. "You too."

She grinned toothily before unshouldering her bow and drawing and arrow from her quiver. I sat down in the grass behind them to watch. Chelsea's first shot skimmed past the left of the target. I shook my head, strung my bow silently, and twanged and arrow straight into the middle of the target. "Try it that way!" I laughed.

I yelped as an arrow suddenly thudded into the ground beside me. "Whoops," cried Matthew as he came over to retrieve the arrow.

"How… you… arrow… defy… er… er, physics?" I stuttered before moving _well out of range._

I got by for an hour and a half unscathed, thankfully. "Hey Chelsea, want to see was Zoe's up to?" I asked her as we went back to our cabins to put my bow back. It was almost as tall as me, and I didn't fancy trying to do anything with that shouldered on my back.

"Sure," Chelsea replied, so we headed off to the stables. It's rare to not find Zoe there, with her Pegasus Freece. It does help that Zoe's a child of Demeter; she has a way with all that nature-y stuff. Although, there's this one Pegasus named Wisp that I kind of like; she's gray and white and very gentle. Of course, I can't talk to her, but I've gotten Matthew to translate a few times. But they all _love_ him, while we attract mice. Just what we need in our cabin.

"Hey Zoe, Freece." I shouted as we jogged down the hill. I waved as Zoe appeared with Freece by her side. Instantly, a few flowers poked up from the grass. It's a good thing any child of Demeter's not allergic to pollen.

Freece whinnied, and Zoe waved. "Hey guys! Freece and I were going to go for a ride. Want to come too?" she called as we skidded to a stop in front of her. I instantly looked at her like she was crazy.

"It's because I'm _sooo _good with Pegasi, right?" I questioned sarcastically. Chelsea rolled her eyes; she may not be that great at archery, but riding Pegasi was one thing she was better at.

"Don't worry," Zoe said in that ever-calm voice of hers, "You can ride Wisp. She won't let you fall… again."

I managed a pained grin. Every since I had fallen of my Pegasi early in my first year, I wasn't thrilled to go up there again. Zoe hadn't been at camp for four years, but every camper knew about it. I still here some comments, mostly from the Ares cabin, like '_Hey, do you remember that day when it started raining half-bloods?' _followed by, _'How could I forget? One landed in front of our cabin!' _I had a sore back for weeks.

"I guess we can go up," I gave in, persuaded by Chelsea's big brown 'Bambi Eyes'. They're a dangerous weapon, trust me.

By the time Zoe had set me up with Wisp, which must have been pretty hard because I was about as helpful as a stiff board, and moved about as much as one as well.

"Everyone ready?" Zoe called out. Chelsea nodded vigorously, while I emitted a strange, high-pitched noise that sounded like a rat being strangled to death. "Let's go!" Zoe cried. All three Pegasi launched into the air at the same time.

Funny, once you get past the eye-twitching heights, it's quite enjoyable up here. Both Zoe and Chelsea kept shooting occasional glances at me. I don't blame them. Anyone who can fall off a Pegasus and manage to plop down right in front of the Ares cabin needs to be watched extremely carefully.

Well we rode up there until I felt like puking, or, 'blowing chunks' as the Hermes cabin says it. At some point in their life, they were all dropped on their heads… a lot.

We waved goodbye to Zoe and figured we'd better check on the cabin. Odds were, they were still making the Ares kids rhyme, and not doubt they were shooting suction-cupped arrows at them.

Chelsea must have been thinking that same thing I was, because we walked calmly through the battle field of rubber-tipped arrows and surprisingly, the Ares cabin happened to be using toilet paper. I just hope those weren't our last rolls…

"Maybe we should stop this…" I wondered out loud.

"Or," Chelsea snickered while handing me one of our suction-cupped arrows. "We could play along with it."

It took me foreverto decide what to do; in a few seconds, the Ares kids were pulling arrows off their foreheads. We were all bent over, laughing at the arrows. Well, it seemed that the noise was attracting other people. Half of the Hermes cabin showed up. I thought they were going to back Ares up, but instead a guy named Trey handed me a small bottle of super glue; he'd probably stolen it somewhere.

He mouthed, '_We were never here,' _and they all left, headed towards the arena, probably for sword practice. I set my half-siblings Emmy and Travis on coating our arrows with super glue. I grabbed a finished one, drew back the string, and lined it up with Sydney's forehead.

Soon, we were all gasping for breath as the whole Ares cabin was in chaos, trying to pull arrows off each other with no avail. Travis thought he heard hoof beats in the distance, so we all scrambled back into our cabin and pretended to be busy, although, an occasional giggle couldn't be held in because the Ares cabin's screams of rage penetrated the walls easily, and who couldn't laugh at that?

We stayed holed up in our cabin for the rest of the afternoon, just in case. It was alright, because there was only the one archery practice today, but dinner was a pretty big priority for us, so when the time came for food, we sent Elise outside to check if the coast was clear. It may seem weird, sending a nine-year-old out there, but Elise is so cute, even the Ares cabin just doesn't have to will to throw a javelin at her.

Elise came back with a positive report: no sign of them. Even so, we rushed toward the Mess Hall, with me in front and Chelsea and Travis guarding the rear. We were the oldest, all twelve, while Elise and Nathan were ushered in the middle. Elise was nine and Nathan was eleven, so, besides Elise, we were kind of bunched up in the age group. It also doesn't help that Sydney was fourteen, pretty much finished with her growth spurt. At least, I hoped so. I don't think that girl could get any bigger or taller.

Before entering the Mess Hall, I whispered, "Straighten up, look up, and don't appear as if you're about to pee your pants, okay?" I was answered by their actions, as they followed my commands. After nodding in approval, we entered at a leisurely pace.

We took our seats and took our bearings. The Ares cabin was already here, the arrows still protruding from their foreheads like horns, and they seemed to have a mind of their own; every slightest movement and they went flopping all over the place.

"Look at them!" Elise giggled, her light cheery eyes dancing in laughter.

"They look like unicorns!" Travis sputtered, he was laughing so hard. We all were. Even malice-filled glances from the Ares cabin couldn't silence us. Only Chiron's hoof stomping impatiently quieted us.

Chiron looked like he was about to speak, when he caught sight of the Ares cabin. He raised his eyebrows and looked towards the Hermes cabin first, then us. We all grinned our best _'It-was-only-a-joke'_ smiles. Chiron shook his head and moved on.

Clearing his throat, he began, "I can see we've had an eventful day. I'd also like to remind all of you that another Capture the Flag will be held in a few days. We'll see who can beat Apollo this time."

If looks could kill, the whole Apollo cabin would've been murdered by the Ares' children, then and there.

After Chiron was done talking, and we had offered our sacrifices to the gods, we began to eat. Healthy food, like always. I can't even remember the last time I had a Mc Donald's Hamburger and Fries.

Throughout dinner, the whole 'Unicorn Ares' thing seemed to keep popping up every two minutes, followed by a one minute laughing fit. And each laughing fit introduced a new shade of red on the Ares cabin's faces.

"They're going to totally maul us tomorrow," Emmy said, maybe a little too cheerily.

"Yah," I agreed, "They'll probably run us through with their unicorn horns!"

"I'm so scared!" Nathan pretended a shudder.

Soon, it was time to go back to the cabin. Suddenly tired, probably from laughing all day, we plopped into our beds. We split Travis and Nathan away from us, mostly because, for some reason, they are the loudest snorers in the world. Once they fall asleep, we'll usually hit them with pillows until they stopped snoring. Oh, and they're heavy sleepers too. Sometimes, we think they're dead, they're sleeping so hard.

"Lights out," I mumbled right before falling asleep. Thirty minutes later, I was woken by the snoring. I was about to climb out of bed and fix the problem when Emmy whispered, "I'm on it."

Two sounds followed: one that sounding like a pillow hitting a rock, and then the sound of silence came. Immediately, I fell back asleep, unaware of the quiet whispers from outside our cabin.


	2. The Mice Get a Mansion

Curse myself for not mentioning this, but the main character's name is Sarah, just if ya'll were wondering. I don't think I mentioned that in the first chapter or not... so just in case, I'll put this little fancy note above that little fancy page break down there *pokes*

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Chapter Two

**THE MICE GET A MANSION**

A blood-curdling scream rang out in our cabin. Naturally, I screeched and tumbled out of bed, landing face-first. I was swiftly joined by Emmy and Chelsea. Elise was awake, but had kept her sanity and not fallen out of her bed. And of course, Travis and Nathan were snoring peacefully away… sometimes I don't understand my half-brothers.

"Light!" I yelled. Being children of Apollo, we didn't really fancy the darkness too much. But of course, when Emmy found the light switch and flicked it on, we were blinking rapidly against the surge of brightness.

"Too much light," Elise groaned.

Then I saw the source of the scream, a figure I sorta recognized.

"Lia?" I growled. It wasn't a smart idea to wake me up at two in the morning. "Oh my gods, why'd you wake us up?" Notice the first question I ask isn't '_Why are you here at 2 A.M.' _or _'What do you think of camp, fought any good monsters yet?'_

Lia was new in camp. She arrived a week or so ago. I'd seen her around, but never really talked to her. As it turns out, she's also a daughter of Dionysus. We were all careful not to offend her. An angry Mr. D is not someone you want to meet out in the forest alone.

"What is that, that… _beast_ doing here!?" she asked, staring down at the floor as if it was going to come alive and eat her.

I shrugged, still looking for the '_beast'_. Soon, Chelsea nudged me and pointed toward Lia's feet. I could tell my sister was trying to keep from snickering.

"You're afraid of a _mouse_?" I snickered, after reaching over and picking the creature up. _Hiya_, the little dark gray mouse squeaked in my mind. _Me Thorn. Biga person scream. Thorn scared her. Thorn sorrys._ Mice may be cute and fun and hyper, but they weren't the best at fourth grade level language arts.

"He says sorry," I translated to Lia. "Not scared of him, are you?"

"Wait, you're talking to that thing?" She asked, bewildered. Then she turned to Thorn, who was still in my palm. "And apology not accepted!" I swore Thorn shrugged.

"Yeah, I'm talking to it. What, can't you talk to grapes?" I grinned.

Lia rolled her eyes, although she had moved away from the mouse.

"Why are you in our cabin?" Nathan asked as he struggled to sit up. Might I add, FINALLY!

"Because there are mice, all in our cabin!" Lia fumed. "And I've seen what you've done to the Ares cabin! You're just as bad as the Hermes kids! You put mice in our cabin!!!"

"Jeez, chill," Emmy said. "Those treats are reserved for those pin-heads only. And we wouldn't put Apollo's symbol animal in your cabin. It would be, like, insulting him." Lia said nothing.

"And so you decided to come to us with your rodent problems?" Chelsea asked after Lia didn't say anything.

"Yes," Lia replied. "Your father's animal _is_ the mouse right?"

I glanced at the furry rodent in my hand. "No, it's actually the badger. You must be mistaken."

Snickers came from my cabin mates, except for Travis; he answered with a loud snort followed by snores. "Look, will you help or not?" Lia pleaded.

"Fine," I growled, "_in the morning._"

"But-"

"You know," Chelsea wondered out loud. "We _do_ have some of those special 'reserved' arrows left, and some super glue."

Lia was out the door in seconds. She should really consider joining the track team or something, as long as we were running behind, bows at the ready.

"Nighty-night!" Elise called, but I was already asleep.

As usual, I was woken up by the sun, although Emmy and Nathan were already up, and their heads were huddled together in deep conversation.

"Morning," I yawned as I walked over to them. "Whatcha' talking about."

"Well, remember how Lia said they had a slight 'rodent problem' in their cabin?" Nathan said. I nodded. Emmy started up with their idea. "We can get all of them to come over here, and then we get Jonathan or someone to build us a big cage for the mice."

"A MOUSE FARM!" They yelled in unison. A groan floated over from Chelsea's direction, which told me she would be up and moving in about ten minutes.

_Sounds good!_ Thorn's voice popped up in my heads and I could tell Nathan and Emmy heard it too.

"Hey Thorn," I said as the little gray mouse scurried up my arm and perched on top of my shoulder.

"Nathan," I ordered, stepping up to my counselor position, not something I have to do very often, mostly in the mornings, "try and wake Travis up. Emphasis on _try._ I'll get Elise."

Soon we were all ready to go. We hurried on breakfast, but we all noticed that the Ares cabin _still_ had unicorn horns, although some of the ends were lopped off, as far as they could cut them. They looked like nubs.

After finishing breakfast with record timing, we marched on over to the Dionysus cabin. It was still empty; the members were still at breakfast no doubt.

"Alright, let's split up!" I said. "Chelsea, you and Emmy go down and talk to Jonathan, you know, of the Hephaestus cabin, about the mouse farm cage." Chelsea gave me a confused look, but I shooed both of them off anyway.

"Can I go too?" Nathan pleaded. "It was partly my idea."

I sighed. "Sure."

Nathan gave a whoop of joy and sprinted off towards Chelsea and Emmy. I turned back to Travis and Elise. "Let's get down to business, shall we?"

The first thought that entered my mind when we walked in was, '_Why does it smell like raisins in here?'_

I think it may have been the grapes scattered around the cabin, some practically raisins.

"Eww," I said, wrinkling my nose. And trust me, that was a huge understatement. All at once, a wave of squeaky mouse voices washed over me. Mice started to pour out onto the ground in front of us.

"Uh…" was all any of us could say. Finally, after scanning the hundred or so mice, I turned to Travis. "Go find Chelsea and them. Tell them we might need a slightly larger cage." Travis nodded blankly and turned out the door.

"Where the heck did they get these many mice?" Elise exclaimed after awhile.

"Well, um, hello." I said bleakly while looking over the swarm of mice. "You guys wanna' come back to our cabin.

Once again, we were pummeled by answers, varying from _Yippee! _To _Follow the Apollo children!_ The most random I heard was_ Do you have duct tape there?_

Elise spun around and exited the cabin. Most of the mice followed her, except for the ones already latched onto my pants and hair. They swung from the little strands like they were swings. It was a bit weird.

I managed to make it back to our cabin without stepping on any of them. When I got there I was greeted by my whole cabin and Jonathan, a son of Hephaestus. Jonathan's pretty good with the metal and stuff (which Hephaestus kid isn't???) so I figured he would build the cage for us.

As it turns out, it was already finished, which I didn't get. Chelsea, Emmy, and Nathan had been gone for about 30 minutes… this Hephaestus kid was either really amazing or just happened to build a ginormo cage in his spare time.

"I finished the cage," Jonathan called out. That cuts it; he's amazing with the metals.

"And it's awesome!" Nathan said before bolting into the cabin, leaving me wondering just how awesome a mouse cage could be.

When I saw it, the first image that popped into my mind was one of those five star hotels in Vegas. The 'cage' was about five feet tall and had a bunch of different floors and tunnels and whatnot. You name it, it was in there. Built-in shelves? Yup. An elevator. Yup. A check in counter? Yup. A luggage compartment? Yuppers. Trust me, I could go on for a _loooooong_ time.

"And where exactly did you find the time to make this?" I asked, dumbfounded, wishing our own cabin was half as nice.

"Well, I was already working on a model of a really awesome hotel," He admitted. Well, that explains the whole 'five star hotel in Vegas' thing. "Basically, I just had to add bars, and that was easy because I didn't get to the outer covering."

"Well, it's awesome," I summed this whole thing up. "And to repay you, how's this proposition: the Hephaestus cabin can be on our team for Capture the Flag."

"Sounds good to me," Jonathan said. "But I've got to go. Something about helping the Demeter cabin with forging." Boy, did he have his work cut out for him. I mean, for a child of Demeter, the goddess of _agriculture_, being around flames is pretty terrifying.

I glanced at the mice scrambling all over me. "Okay guys, time to go to your new home!" I did in my best imitation of their squeaky voices. One of them must have noticed, because before he climbed down from my shoulder, he said, _Apollo girl not a mouse!_

_ Well, sorry! _I thought sarcastically.

I looked over and saw Emmy shouldering her bow. "Where're you going?" I asked.

"To the archery range," she said simply. "We're supposed to be teaching the newbies in the Hermes cabin how to shoot a bow."

Great… newbies…

So I found myself showing some new kid named Austin how to string a short simple bow. I was talking about the dynamics of the bow, and, surprisingly, he was listening. Most newbies ignored my rambling and talked about random things.

This kid had just gotten here too, like Lia, but he was still undetermined.

"There," I said as a test drew the bow to its full length. "You try."

He ended up drawing it back to ½ its full drawback, then his fingers slipped off the string and it lashed his arm. I shook my head. "Hey Travis!" I called.

My half-brother came bounding up with an arrow notched to his string. "What?" he asked.

"Work with Austin here," I sighed, and then whispered in his ear. "He needs some work." Travis nodded then proceeded to show the new kid how to draw fully back.

I spend the rest of the time trying to find out how many arrows could fit in the bulls-eye. So far, I was up to 19, but that's all that could fit, even with my slender arrows.

"Dinner time!" Chelsea called from the other end of the targets. A clang of bows hitting the grass, all from the newbies, sounded and the ran toward dinner. I huffed and collected all the Camp's bows before we went to dinner.

Well, the Ares cabins finally removed their horn/arrow stubs. Don't ask how; I don't know. But they looked like they were up to something, and we weren't too keen to find out what exactly it was right then.

"Hey you know that Austin kid, the newbie?" Travis asked as we were eating.

"Duh," I mumbled as I chewed on a large piece of steak.

"He really improved. Maybe he's even better than Chelsea now."

I smiled. "Maybe, but I'm willing to bet that Chelsea would beat him at anything involving Pegasi any day of the week."

Chelsea grinned. "And don't ever forget it, any of you!" She exclaimed.

Soon, dinner ended and we were about to leave for our cabins when Nathan said, "Wait, bonfire tonight!" This perked our spirits. This was one of our "talents" I guess you could say. We're cheery and friendly people, expect when woken at 2 A.M. in the morning; we weren't night people.

The fire blazed high as we led a camp fire sing-a-long. It's lotsa fun, even when the Ares cabin don't join in; now, they're not what we call cheery and friendly people. The fire burned a happy blue, sometimes flickering gold. It reflected our emotions, I guess.

By the time this was over, we were covered in soot, grinning from ear to ear, and on the verge of falling over asleep. Somehow, we all managed to get back to our cabin without collapsing. But we did, and it was the usual: snoring, pillow-hitting, silence, deep sleep, happy.

You know how half-bloods never have 'normal' dreams, they always mean something? I think I just broke that statement because I dreamed of clouds, the sun, puff balls, and the mouse mansion in our cabin.


	3. I Pin Cushion Some Campers

I know, this one is very short. It makes me ashamed to write... but the next chapter is the longest so far! So... yes... summary: not the best chapter ever...

**:3**

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Chapter Three

**I Pin-Cushion Some Campers**

Somehow, that night, I found myself perched up in a great big sycamore, guarding our team's flag. That newbie Austin was with me. Thank the gods he wasn't armed with a bow though. Our cabin had allied with Hephaestus (of course), Hermes, Demeter, and Poseidon. Basically, four cabins. The Poseidon cabin's emptiness was made up for my Hermes, because that cabin was humongous.

I sighed and pulled back my bow experimentally while I heard the sound of steel upon steel in the distance. "How'd I get stuck with this job?" I groaned.

"Because of your new stunning arrows," Austin said simply. He was right. Me and Travis had been working on these arrows that don't really hurt (it feels more like a dart, trust me), but can partly paralyze you. Actually, when we were testing it this morning, my leg was numb for a couple of hours.

"Where are they?" I murmured as I scanned the forest floor. A few leaves from a large shrub floated noiselessly towards the ground. I winked at Austin before drawing back a very skinny arrow. They may be useful, but the wind will easily blow them off course due to their, er, slenderness.

Quickly, I tested to wind, although there wasn't much need because we were in a very dense part of the forest. Letting the arrow fly, I was greeted by a girlish scream, even though most screams usually are girlish anyways...

Lia stumbled out of the bushed followed by her older half-brother and two of the Ares cabin members. "What the heck was that?" she screeched as she attempted to get up from the ground. I could see the arrow got her in the thigh. She probably wouldn't be able to walk straight for awhile.

"Hey guys!" I said, grinning wolfishly as I leaned against the trunk. "Oh, and you're welcome. Besides, I think those mice like our cabin better than your grape-stenched one."

Afterwards, I would be wondering if _stenched_ was a word, but it seemed right to use at the time.

"You are dead, freak!" One of her older brothers snarled.

I've been called a freak multiple times, so, rather than be insulted by it, I find it easier to take it as a compliment. "Hey, thanks bestie," I said before shooting one of the hissing arrows into his left arm.

Soon afterwards, the four waddled away, persuaded by the bunches of stick-like arrows protruding from them so that they looked like paranoid mutant hedgehogs.

"Silly Ares and Dionysus kids," I said happily as I shouldered my bow. "Fighting with a spear or sword all the time, not to mention getting maimed every five minutes. Give me a bow and a quiver of arrows any day."

We kept a sharp eye out for any of our returning campers, although, I did see a small tail disappear under a leaf a few trees away. I just hope it wasn't one of the mice, testing his luck at being an escapee. For a mouse, I guess that's a close as you get to taking a 'joy ride'.

And we already knew that the other team would never be stealing our flag, mostly on the hunch that the Ares cabin wouldn't be the best climbers in the world. I don't know why, but we all just seemed to think that. Of course, they do have the Athena cabin on their side… that's where you need to be worried.

Even with the Athena cabin, I have to admit, I almost fell asleep out of boredom a few times. We caught no sight of the enemy team.

With no warning, a loud caterwaul rose through the tree tops, followed by screams. My face hardened as I shouldered my bow. "Austin, stay here with the flag."

"But-"

"Stay!" I growled before taking off through the treetops. Now, I'm not as good as a squirrel or anything, but I can tell you, I was moving pretty fast through those trees. Grasping one branch, swinging from that one onto another, and then leaping for another. The branches began moving in a blur as I found my natural rhythm.

It didn't take long to reach the source of the noise. And when I saw the reason for the commotion, I nearly fell out of the trees, saving myself by gripping onto a fat hardy branch. Campers, of both teams, were fending off multiple hellhounds, perhaps a half a score in all. (That's fancy talk for ten…never mind.)

Pulling myself onto the branch, I fumbled for a grip on my bow and drew an arrow. I made one small hellhound burst into dust with a well aimed arrow. Four others had disintegrated now as well. I fired off three quick arrows and leapt down from the tree. It turned out, only one of the arrows made its target. Everyone else finished off the rest.

Shaking from surprise, I rushed into the small clearing where they had attacked. My first instinct was to look for Chelsea and my half-siblings. Chelsea and Emmy immediately rushed up towards me.

"See if there are any injured," I told them in a quiet voice. They nodded silently and rushed off. Apollo is the god of medicine as well as many other things.

I happened to look to my left to find Matthew leaning against his blade. My eyes widened in alarm as I hurried over to him. "What happened to you?" I asked.

"It got me from behind, sneaky thing. Though, I gave it what it deserved. But I'm fine." He said weakly, but somehow he managed to smile. For the first time, I saw the long claw slash across his side. He hid it expertly with his arm, so he simply looked winded.

"It'll be best to get you to the creek," I said to myself as I stripped a spiral of cloth from the bottom of my jeans, using one of my arrowheads skillfully, and wrapped it tightly around Matthew's stomach. So much for my new jeans. I beckoned the nearest camper over.

"Trey, get over here." I snapped impatiently. Obviously, my tone was urgent enough that Trey, a son of Hermes, rushed over quickly. "Help me prop Matthew up. We need to get him to the creek over there." I beckoned north with my hand.

We made slow progress, and it seemed hours until we reached the small creek. My shoulders were actually starting to ache.

"Here," I said breathlessly. Both Trey and I waded into the still-cold water. I winced at the cold, and waiting a few seconds before wading back out. Matthew's injuries would be completely healed at the touch of water, him being a son of Poseidon. Huh, so much for us Apollo children's knowledge of 'healing'.

"Let's get back." Trey said through chattering teeth. The water was pretty frigid, even though it was the end of spring. Apparently though, this creek did not know that.

We all nodded and trekked back towards the clearing were the turmoil had taken place.

No one had been seriously hurt, save Matthew, but Matthew wasn't too keen to tell anyone that a hellhound had beaten him up.

Now that all this was over, a sudden wave of exhaustion swept over me. Chiron had called Capture the Flag to a pause, saying we would continue it tomorrow from where we left off.

We hurried back to our cabin, and last thing I remember hearing was a squeaky mouse voice asking, _'Can I have a tomato?'_

"No, I don't have any tomatoes…" I mumbled before everything went a peaceful dark, the feeling of sleep.


	4. The Pretty Yellow Fishie

Sorry this took so long to get up everyone... I have been being lazy, just like Sarah in the story. At the end of the chapter is the name of Chapter 5. It should give you a pretty good idea of what's going to happen.

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Chapter Four

**THE PRETTY YELLOW FISHIE**

Just before dawn, I was not-so-subtly awakened.

Sitting bolt upright, I blinked rapidly. Three blobs stood over me.

"Blobs," I muttered unintelligently.

Turns out, they were not blobs, but angry Ares kids. "Um… hi," I said. They just glared down at me.

"You're going to pay tonight," said the oldest kid, Jerry. "Tonight, at Capture the Flag."

"Okay." I stared at them.

"Aren't you going to retort or something?" Pure confusion shone in their eyes. "Aren't you going to attempt to pelt a book at us?"

I shrugged. "Not really."

"Oh… well, okay then. This is quite awkward." They stood there for a moment, then quietly shuffled out of the tent. Just for kicks, I picked up the nearest object; a book titled _101 Ways to Kill a Monster_, and chucked it out the door. The yelp from the Ares kid made me feel warm and fuzzy inside.

The sun was just beginning to peek over the horizon. I figured I had a little bit of sleep left, so I curled back into bed and buried myself in the pillow.

Morning came too soon. Elise had to shake me awake. "Sarah… Sarah, wake up!"

I leapt out of bed wildly, screaming, "Attack! Sound the alarms!" That was all I got done with until I did a spectacular face plant on the floor. Trust me; I could've monologued for much longer if stupid ol' gravity hadn't ruined the effect.

Elise's eyes were wide. "You were snoring louder than Travis!"

"Whoot! I have the snoring record now!" I jumped up. Everyone else was awake.

I hesitated; should I tell them that the Ares cabin had come in and basically threatened us? Naw, no thanks. I don't want to ruin their eagerness for the continued Capture the Flag game tonight.

"Well, let's go to breakfast," Travis said as he pulled on a shoe.

"You guys go ahead; I need to get dressed." They hurried out the door at the thought of food as I pulled on my pair of jeans. Only then did I realize that my right pant leg only came down to my shin. I had forgotten about the night before. For all of you fashion freaks out there, let's just say this is the new trend.

I groaned, but there was nothing to be done. All of my other pants were dirty. After slipping on the bright orange T-shirt that said: Camp Half-Blood, I hurried out of the cabin towards the Pavilion.

I joined the kids from the Hermes cabin and the kids, er, kid from the Poseidon cabin.

I fell into pace with Matthew. He said, "Did you hear we're getting some new campers?"

I perked up. "Really? When are they getting here?"

"Should be today," he replied as we neared the Pavilion. "Two of them. One's already been claimed."

"Which cabin?"

"Athena."

Great. Yet another kid here who's smarter than me. "What about the other one?" Who knows, I could be getting a new half-sibling.

Our group entered the pavilion. It seemed as if we were the last to arrive.

"Undetermined." The pavilion begun to hush. "I'll catch you later. We've got canoeing this afternoon, remember."

Truthfully, I had completely forgotten. But I just nodded and slid into the Apollo table. Elise and Travis were having a heated discussion; something about 'Can you light fire to the sun?'. I worry about them sometimes, you know.

"What's up?" I turned away from Elise and Travis.

"Nothing much." Chelsea looked like a starving bear as she dug into her breakfast. It consisted of scrambled eggs and sausage. Yum, yum.

Nathan glanced up from his plate. A piece of egg was perched on his nose. My half-siblings can get down and dirty when food is mentioned. "Well, the Ares kids are shooting daggers at us."

I sputtered on my orange juice, nearly spraying it into Emmy's face. "D-daggers?!"

Chelsea glanced at me. Slowly, she said, "Theoretical daggers, Sarah. He means that they are looking angrily at us."

Pheww! That was a relief. "Don't forget, we've gotta go canoeing this afternoon."

Everyone looked at me funny. "What?" I glanced at them, a frazzled look upon my face.

"No, we don't," Emmy said. "Do we?"

"Well, Matthew said we had canoeing-"

You know how I _almost _spewed orange juice in Emmy's face? Well, I guess she wasn't too grateful, because in the middle of a large gulp, the orange juice just LEAPT FROM HER MOUTH! Onto my face! And other extremities, of course.

"What the HECK Emmy!" I growled loudly.

Emmy just sipped her cup nonchalantly, the little demon. My eye twitched and Chelsea and Travis grabbed their napkins and pelted them at me as if their lives depended on it.

Slowly, I tightened my fist around the napkins and proceeded to wipe up the orange juice that soaked me head to toe.

And the Ares cabin saw the whoooooole thing.

After taking quite some time to persuade my cabinmates that we, indeed, had canoeing this afternoon, they unwillingly followed me to the lake.

The bright summer sun shone proudly in the clear sky, making the water shimmer. "Shiny," Travis chirped, his eyes sparkling as much as the water.

"Yes Travis," I replied. "Very shiny."

Matthew was waiting for us. He had already propped up several canoes. In fact, there were too many for just our cabin and him. My question was answered when he asked, "Did you catch the Demeter cabin on the way over here?"

I shook my head. Well, at least Zoe's coming too.

I poked the canoe. I learned that wasn't the most brilliant thing to do because I was warmly greeted by the hottest thing I've ever touched. I yelped in surprise and topped over onto the sand.

"Yeah, I probably should've told you. The canoes are really hot. That's the disadvantage to these new steel canoes."

I winced as I examined my scalded finger. "You _probably _should have mentioned that BEFORE I touched that tin can."

Matthew shrugged. "You shouldn't have been touching it anyways."

I gave him the evil eye. "Don't start with me, boy." He inched away.

I turned to say something to Chelsea, but then I saw the Demeter kids racing down the hill. Their counselor, Jeff, skidded to a halt in front of us.

"Sorry we're late," he panted. "It took a little longer to tend to the garden than usual."

They are such treehuggers.

I nodded a greeting to Zoe as she jogged up with the rest of the Demeter cabin.

"So, let's get these tin cans a floatin'!" I said.

Matthew had to correct me of course. "Actually, we need to go over safety procedures and types of strokes first."

I narrowed my eyes; under my breath I said, "Screw safety procedures."

Emmy giggled quietly.

I'll admit, I basically tuned out everything Matthew said. Chelsea had to give me a hard poke when he was done. I wiped the drool off my chin and scrambled to grab a paddle. I glanced around, "Where are the stinkin' life jackets?"

Matthew said, "Chiron's getting more. He condemned our last set."

"Oh, that makes me feel so safe," I said, imagining what 'condemned life jackets' would look like.

Matthew paused and looked back at me. "Don't worry, I'll be here."

I stopped next to him and looked at him for a moment. Then wacked him with my paddle. Huh? What do you mean I ruined a perfectly good romantic moment?

Anywaaays, we all piled into our canoes. "Two to a canoe, people!" Matthew said. But no one paid much attention to him, because Chelsea, Emmy, and Zoe piled into a canoe, and Travis and Nathan took one.

I stood there, baffled. "Way to think of others, people! And by others, I mean me!!!"

"That's okay," Matthew said. "You can go with me."

At first, I wasn't too keen on that idea. But then you get thinking: Hey, this kids a son of Poseidon. So he can just steer the boat with his water power thingie.

Of course, my reasoning is wrong. He _made _me paddle. Which makes no sense AT ALL, I might add.

We'd only been paddling in circles (my own technique) when, saw a silver shimmer under the water. I leaned over to get a better look, and the next thing I know, the canoe's tipping over and I'm in the water.

I floundered about until I got my bearings. "Nice job," Matthew said dryly before he did some Poseidon-y thing and got the boat back up right. I scrambled back in.

"Well, it's your fault, for making me paddle," I said grumpily, my clothes plastered to my body.

Most of us know that wet jeans are not the most comfortable thing in the world. Those lucky few who've never experienced it, well… you're lucky. Like I said, NOT a comfortable feeling.

At least, when you're already soaked, tipping over again isn't much of a problem. And trust me, we did plenty of that. So let's see. Sarah's list of things that she is not good at? So far I got: riding Pegasi, and keeping a canoe upright. Yup, that sounds right. May as well add romance on there too.

We tipped again. This time it was not my fault! Well, not completely my fault.

The canoe shook, and the canoe rocked violently back and forth before it completely tipped to the left. The difference this time, the stupid metal canoe came and bonked me on the head.

Once I was in the water, I moved my arms to tread water, but they wouldn't listen to my brain. Come on arms, wake up!

I tried kicking with my feet, but it seemed that my whole body was taking a little break. I could imagine one of those 'Be back in 15 minutes' kinda sign hanging from my neck. Only one problem: I would be slightly _dead _in 15 minutes.

I slowly floated down, as if I was some kind of rock. My lungs began to beg for air, but I kept my mouth sealed shut. Head pounding, I tried to look around, but my vision began to falter. It was beginning to look like the static on one of those old TVs.

All I could make out in the murky water was a large mustard-yellow blob with orange eyes.

Yellow fishie. Pretty yellow fishie, was all my brain was capable of doing. The throbbing in my head increased; my lungs couldn't take it anymore. My mouth jerked open and breathed. But there was only water. I coughed the water out, but there was now zero oxygen in my lungs.

This was my time of dying, yet all I could think of was the yellow fish.

It came closer. It kinda looked like a snake, with a long, coil-y body and fangs coming down over its bottom lip. Pretty, yellow fishie.

Pretty… yellow… fishie…

Fishie… Yel…low…….. Pret…...ty.

My vision went entirely black. I imagined I could feel the fish's scale-y tail wrapping around my body, squeezing until there was nothing left.

Fishie….

A violent spasm ran through my body and I began coughing even more violently. How am I still alive?

"Pretty… y-yellow… fishie," I found myself saying. Air. I was above the water.

"What did she say?" "Fishie?" I could hear the comments buzzing in the air like a swarm of angry bees. They made my head hurt even more.

I wanted them all to just leave me alone to die, but the voices didn't die off, they just got louder. I felt a hand rest on my forehead.

Well, they weren't going to leave a dying warrior in peace, so I forced my eyes open. It looked like I was still underwater, everything was so blurry. But it was light. I could see a big orange blob that I could definitely recognize as the sun.

But in front of the sun were two figures. My sister and Matthew. I groaned and forced my eyelids to open further.

Everyone cheered.

"Oh, you're alive," Chelsea sighed. Her voice shook with relief.

"Where's the fishie, er, um, fish?" I sat up immediately, wincing at the stab of pain my head experienced from the action.

"What fish?" They both looked at me with puzzled faces.

I was beginning to panic. "The yellow fish! Where is it?"

"Please, just rest Sarah," Chelsea fretted. "It's just a fish."

I tried to remember. "No…" It wasn't a fish. It had been… "A monster!" I shouted shrilly, just as the orange eyes appeared below the waves.

"A monster?" Everyone repeated it.

A drizzle of water sounded as the monster reared its ugly head. I don't know what my drowned mind was thinking when it said this was _pretty_.

We all screamed; I clutched onto the side of the boat just in time. The sea serpent slapped the water with its long, reptilian tail. An immense wave sent to small canoes topping over the waters.

Thankfully, it was sending us closer to shore. Forgetting my near-drowning, I threw Chelsea a paddle and picked up my own. It's nice when leadership skills come out in dark times.

"Paddle!!!" I yelled over the shrieking of the serpent. Only half heard me.

We began to paddle for our lives. The serpent's head melted back into the water. It was swimming underneath us. It hit me; this creature is what had tipped my canoe.

I trembled with relief as the keel brushed the pebbles at the bottom of the lake. I leaped out of the canoe, splashing. We waded and stumbled to the beach. My first instinct was to go back and help the others. Some were pulling up the shore. Others were still bobbing out on the new waves the sea monster was creating by slapping its tail on the water with a shattering force.

"We need to get help," I said, trusting my voice not to crack.

"I'll stay here," Matthew said. His face was hardened in a determined look.

I blinked. "Okay, be careful." He simply nodded. I motioned to Chelsea. "We need to find Chiron, he can do something."

But we decided that finding Chiron would consume too much time, so this is what we did:

We ran through the camp screaming, "GET YOUR WEAPONS AND GO TO THE LAKE. MONSTER! LIVES ARE AT STAKE!!!!" A stream of kids bristling with weaponry streamed out of the buildings. Heheh… I didn't even notice that rhymed. (Seriously, while I was typing that, I didn't realize it rhymed =P) Well, we are children of Apollo after all…

Sydney led the Ares cabin towards the lake, swords raised in the air.

One of them was even screaming, "This. Is. SPARTAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!"

Weird, but a good effect I guess.

We bumped into Chiron. He was leading around two girls, both around me and Chelsea's age.

Chiron looked startled to see us. "Oh, hello Sarah, Chelsea. I'd like you to meet our two newest campers-"

"No time for that!" Chelsea shrieked.

I, gasping for breath, added, "Monster. In lake. Need help!!! Lives at stake!"

The two girls looked horrified. Chiron, without a word, galloped off, probably going to get Mr. D. Chelsea took off back to the lake. I was about to follow her when I added a parting word with the two newbies. "Oh, and welcome to Camp Half Blood." I shot them a toothy grin and went pelting down towards the lake.

When we arrived, we were both doubled over from all that sprinting. I also realized that I had forgotten to grab my bow, but it seemed it wasn't needed.

The kids that we had summoned were out braving the storm-like waves and were pelting spears and arrows at the monster. The weapons stuck out from it until it looked like a pin cushion, but none had pierced the monster deep enough to kill it.

Without warning, it turned to dust right before my eyes. I learned later that Ethan of the Hermes cabin has es'ploded it with a nice spear-poke to the eye. That, plus all the other damage it had taken, had ultimately destroyed it.

I looked at Chelsea with round eyes. "First hellhounds, and then a great big yellow sea monster. What's going on?"

* * *

The idea for the next chapter was inspired by a friend. Heck, it was a whole lot better that my idea, where Matthew goes missing :)

Anywho, here is the chapter name: Camp Gets a Pool

Boy, this should be interesting...


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